Robert Hoyle Upchurch was born in High Falls, North Carolina, on August 23, 1923, and grew up there in a large family as the second youngest of eleven children, known to his relatives as Hoyle. After finishing school, he joined some of his siblings in California and worked in the aircraft industry, developed an interest in flying, entered the Army Air Corps, and after rigorous training became a fighter pilot with the Flying Tigers under General Claire L. Chennault in China. An accomplished pilot, he flew the dangerous route known as "the hump" between Burma and China. On his first mission in China, at age 21, he was killed in a crash on October 6, 1944, after Flying Tigers aircraft responded to Japanese battle planes in southern Hunan, and he was officially listed as missing in action. Local authorities and residents recovered his body from the wreckage near Dagang, held a mourning ceremony, buried him, and maintained his grave for decades while trying to learn his identity and contact his family. Contact with the American military and his relatives was finally made in 2005, and after a search team recovered remains from the crash site, DNA identified them as Upchurch's. His remains were returned to High Falls, where he was buried between his parents, and his family expressed lasting gratitude to the Chinese people who had cared for his grave for more than sixty years. His story came to symbolize the wartime alliance and friendship between the Chinese and American peoples during their shared struggle against Japanese aggression.